Ange Postecoglou felt we showed ‘a different side to ourselves’ as we secured a great collective effort”
Ange Postecoglou felt we showed ‘a different side to ourselves’ as we secured a hard-fought 1-0 win at Luton in the Premier League on Saturday.
Micky van de Ven’s first Spurs goal on 52 minutes, set up by James Maddison following a short corner, stretched our unbeaten start to the season to eight games, with six draws and two wins our best-ever start in the Premier League after eight games, indeed, our best start since Bill Nicholson’s double winners, Bill’s team reeling off 11 wins on the trot in 1960/61.
Our first competitive visit to Kenilworth Road in over 31 years ended up being a classic ‘game of two halves’ as we could have been out of sight after creating numerous chances in the early stages, only to be reduced to 10 men just before half-time following Yves Bissouma’s second yellow card.
As expected, Luton piled on the pressure with the man advantage but, led by the outstanding Cuti Romero, we dealt with everything they threw at us – Guglielmo Vicario only seriously tested once by Carlton Morris.
Speaking to the Review Show on SPURSPLAY, Ange told us: “We started the game really well, as well as we’ve played all season, created some brilliant chances, probably should have been two or three up, then the sending off changes the context of the game.
“We then had to show a different side of ourselves, and I thought we did that awfully well. I thought the guys handled being down a man really well in terms of maintaining our composure. We were always a threat going forward, they had a couple of chances but for the most part, we minimised it and the guys coming on helped us get over the line.”
Asked what was said at half-time, with us facing the second half a man down, Ange added: “I still felt we could play our game. We still wanted to press, still wanted, when we had the ball, to use it really well. We figured we would have to defend a bit more but, you know, we’ve some pretty strong boys back there who don’t mind that physical battle, and with Vic behind them, they handled that well.
“We minimised the number of times they got into our box, which was key for us, because if they got in more times there was always the possibility something could happen. With the ball, as I said, we were always going to be a threat, so, stay alert. Mase (Ryan Mason, coach) works with the boys on set pieces and always says if there’s a quick one on, play it, we played it quickly, Madders with a bit of magic and Micky gets the goal.”
